Delta Apologizes For ‘H8GAYS’ Confirmation Code On Boarding Pass

A mother who was breastfeeding on a Delta Airlines flight is demanding an apology after two flight attendants approached her to “cover up” as she nursed her 1-year-old son. (credit: Scott Olson/Getty Images)

PENSACOLA, Fla. (CBS Tampa) — Delta Air Lines is apologizing after a passenger’s boarding pass has a confirmation code of “H8GAYS.”

Jeff White, a student at the University of West Florida, told The Washington Post that he noticed the code shortly after printing out his boarding pass for a flight from Pensacola, Fla., to Albany, N.Y.

“At first I didn’t think I read it right,” White told the Post. “I was worried that another customer might think I somehow picked that code. If I were a gay male, I might have thought that a Delta worker purposely gave me that code, and that would have made me extremely uncomfortable.”

White said he was surprised the airline didn’t block that type of string of random numbers and letters from printing out.

“I’m an IT major, and what surprises me is that they didn’t block [his confirmation code] as a possibility of the string of random numbers and letters in the software they use to generate” the code, White explained to the Post. “I’m sure they removed many four-letter words that would be seen as offensive. I’m surprised that ‘gays’ and ‘H8’ weren’t blocked as well.”

Delta apologized for the “H8GAYS” boarding pass.

“These confirmation codes are computer-generated and are completely random,” Russell Cason, a Delta spokesperson, told the Post. “We will make every effort to ensure that a similar combination does not occur in the future.”